Blog

Four Tips for Great Yards

IMG_0933Given the popularity of indoor/outdoor living and the power of well-placed plantings to sell houses, environmentally smart landscaping will be de rigueur in the coming years.

The role of landscape professionals in creating these yards and communities will be crucial, says builder Tyler Jones of Las Vegas-based Blue Heron. “Landscape designers have become more important in every sense of the word,” he says.

Here are four tips from builders on how to work with landscape professionals for the best results.

–Find designers and installers that can execute your vision. In addition to relying on referrals, Blue Heron looks for design firms that win awards, which indicates a company striving to do high-quality work, he says.

KB Home chooses consultants that specialize in selecting drought-tolerant plants, “so that when the water company comes out for inspection, we don’t have issues and they have the irrigation clocks set right,” says Rob McGibney, KB division president for Las Vegas. “We figured out who was good and stuck with them.”

–Bring consultants in early. Landscape architects can help builders imagine how a patio or side yard might integrate with a kitchen or family room and what the outdoor space could be. Jones consults with landscape architects at the sketch stage, when his firm is figuring out what materials will do the best job of blurring the interior and exterior.

Utah builder Jake Joines brings in landscape architects when he’s creating the house plan and its sidewalk, patios, and driveway. “They can help you incorporate specific plantings into your design, suggest where to put larger plants to make the outdoors comfortable and intimate, and influence where you put planters,” he says. “Then we regroup toward the end of the job to find those plants.”

–Let your pro fine-tune the design. Landscape professionals can help builders understand what a composition might look like when the house is ready to be sold. “A lot of our builders are selling homes in December and January,” says landscaping professional Andy Baron. “We look at seasonability to determine what will be blooming when the homes come on the market.”

–Seek out local nurseries that offer high-performance plants. Arizona builder Austin Trautman is a fan of Dig It in downtown Phoenix, run by “plant geeks” who are continually developing native plant cultivars that need little water and offer many varieties of color and growth habit.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

How to build the custom home you’ve always wanted

As Anne and Kevin Boyce’s children grew, the Falls Church couple recognized that their beloved home seemed to shrink and their hilly, nearly nonexistent yard didn’t offer space for outdoor play.

Like many local buyers, they wanted to stay in their neighborhood, where they have friends and participate in community activities throughout the year, but they couldn’t find a home to match their wish list.

“We were so lucky because a woman who owned a home on a nice half-acre lot around the corner from us wanted to move to Leesburg to be closer to her grandchildren,” Anne Boyce says. “We bought the house as a teardown and then were initially overwhelmed at the idea of designing a custom home.”

Building such a home requires a vision and patience as well as an experienced team of professionals who can provide buyers with advice throughout the process, which can take more than a year, depending on the condition of the lot and the architecture of the home. The design and permitting phase generally takes six months, and building can take 10 months to a year; the Boyces’ home took approximately 16 months to design and build.

Although custom homes often are among the more-expensive dwellings in the Washington region, they can be built to meet the budget needs of people seeking to spend a lot less than $1 million. Some smaller, simpler homes can be built to a buyer’s specification for as little as $400,000, depending on the cost of the lot and materials chosen.

“You can do a $5,000 Ikea kitchen in a custom home or spend $60,000 on just the cabinets,” says George Myers, who is president of GTM Architects in Bethesda and who built the Boyces’ home. “It’s important to be upfront about this from the start and show buyers a high, middle and low option so they decide where they want to spend their money.”

Myers says a 4,000-square-foot custom home, with a 1,500-square-foot finished basement, in the D.C. area is typically priced in the $800,000 to $1.2 million range.

“We draw up plans based on a wish list and come up with a price,” Myers says. “If it needs to be 15 percent less, then we start to look at which materials to swap out to reduce the cost.”

To minimize sticker shock, says Jonathan Lerner, chief executive of Meridian Homes in Bethesda, it’s best to have the builder involved during the design process to talk about what different choices will cost.

Some custom-home buyers already own a lot, but many rely on a builder or realty agent to help them find one.

“The choice of lot needs to take into consideration the neighborhood where you want to live, the size of the lot and the home you want to build, whether it has trees or a stream and whether it’s hilly or flat,” says Joshua Baker, founder and co-chairman of BOWA Builders in McLean. “We do a feasibility study to determine the ramifications of a particular lot for construction purposes and research any governmental and deed restrictions that could impact the project.”

Builders often have an easier time finding a lot because they hear about the ones that have yet to be put on the public market, Lerner says.

“We know about local regulations and we hire a civil engineer, so we know before we start building if there are site-specific issues or impact fees,” he says.

Sometimes zoning restrictions on the configuration of a site won’t allow for a three-car garage or a home with a large footprint.

John Joy, owner of Joy Custom Design Build in McLean, says he and his wife, Lisa Joy, a real estate agent with McEnearney Associates, find the lot for 90 percent of their customers. Home sellers and their agents often contact them directly when they anticipate that their home will be a teardown, one that’s more valuable for the land than the home.

“It’s much less costly to tear down a home and start from scratch rather than try to save part of the home,” Lisa Joy says.

While tearing down a home to start fresh is cost-effective for the buyers and, Lisa Joy says, fine with sellers who want the best price for their home, sometimes neighbors are less enthusiastic about teardowns. In neighborhoods across the area — including Bethesda and Chevy Chase in Maryland; Forest Hills, Wesley Heights and Massachusetts Avenue Heights in Washington; and Arlington, McLean and Falls Church in Virginia — neighbors have occasionally banded together to stop a builder from tearing down a home, but they rarely are able to prevent that from happening.

“Teardowns are so common in most neighborhoods inside the Beltway that we haven’t had very many complaints,” Lisa Joy says. “We put our phone number right on our signs so that neighbors can contact us directly with concerns or complaints, and we’re very responsive.”

Lisa Joy says that they talk to the neighbors personally and explain what will be built. Most people understand that today’s buyers want high ceilings, large windows and open floor plans, which are hard to get by simply remodeling, she says.

“The more people realize that a new, custom home in their neighborhood raises everyone’s property values, the more accepting they are of a teardown,” she says.

John Joy says their custom homes cost an average of $3.5 million but can cost as much as $8 million. He says that about half of their customers pays cash, a fourth pays cash for the lot and finances the construction of the home, and the other fourth finances the entire purchase with a down payment of 20 to 25 percent.

“Few lenders offer construction loans because they aren’t sold to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac,” says Michael Johnston, vice president and branch manager of Howard Bank in Timonium, Md. “The lender needs to understand the construction process and communicate with an appraiser about the value of the land and the future home.”

Johnston says a typical construction loan requires borrowers to pay interest only on the amount of the loan that covers the lot while the home is under construction. The lender lets builders draw on the loan at intervals to pay for the land preparation and building the home, with an inspection required after each draw to make sure the home is being built according to the specifications of the contract. Qualifying for a construction loan usually requires a minimum credit score of at least 680, a down payment of at least 10 percent, and proof of income, assets and cash reserves to handle the costs of maintaining their current home while their new home is being built, Johnston says.

Most custom-home builders can recommend a local lender with experience in financing the construction of a home.

“The lender usually needs to see at least preliminary plans and the budget for a home in order to approve a loan,” Myers says.

While a lender is an important part of your team if you need to finance your custom home, you also need an architect, a civil engineer, a landscape architect, and possibly even an arborist and an interior designer to partner with your builder, Baker says. He says the builder will typically manage that group for you. Some design-build firms have in-house architects and designers, while other builders work with a variety of architects and designers. While most architects and builders will work on any style of home, it’s usually best to align your style preferences with the bulk of the work of your team. For example, if you prefer contemporary styles, choose an architect and builder with lots of experience designing those types of homes rather than someone who typically builds traditional ones.

“You need to check out the track record of an architect and a builder by asking around and doing some research on them,” Myers says.

Experts recommend reviewing a portfolio of a builder’s work and requesting a phone call with one or more recent buyers to find out about their experience. If a model or custom home is available, it’s also smart to tour the home in person.

“I asked friends who had built custom homes for recommendations and then took a lot of time looking at homes designed by the people I interviewed until I found someone I felt I could trust,” Anne Boyce, the custom-home owner of Falls Church, says. “We made a wish list of everything we might want in a home and then narrowed it down with our architect’s help. I showed them photos of homes that I like, and we worked with an interior designer who helped with all the decisions, too.”

Lerner says you can look online for local builders who do custom homes in the area you want to live. He recommends Houzz.com and Porch.com, websites where custom builders often feature photos of their homes.

“We work with a handful of local architects who are experienced so we can help our customers find one who’s appropriate for their style and budget,” Lerner says.

Baker says that an important element of building a custom home is communication with your team.

“We have a weekly meeting with buyers during the design phase and then regular on-site meetings during the building phase to make sure they are getting exactly what they want,” ­Baker says.

“Most people come into the custom-home process with ideas and photos of what they like and some even have floor plans,” Lerner says. “It’s so much easier than it was 20 years ago when we had to interpret what our buyers wanted. Now people can quickly find an image of the staircase they love or the layout they want.”

Myers says that it can be more cost-effective to modify an existing floor plan, which can be fairly easy if you want something relatively simple such as a customized, center-hall, Colonial-style home.

“Most buyers want a particular style such as French country or contemporary or shingle-style for the outside and then about half of them work with an interior designer to pick the materials for the inside of the house,” Myers says. “Sometimes a builder will have a showroom, or you can look at other homes they’ve built to help make decisions. We show people photos of the most recent homes we’ve built and drive by them so they can see the different materials available and how they look.”

Myers says the budget always has to be part of the process.

“One of the things that is so great about custom homes is that you can decide whether you want $100,000 worth of appliances or $20,000 worth,” Lerner says. “You can decide how much to spend on the level of finish inside and outside and whether you want to spend a lot or a little on your outdoor space.”

All homes today are built with higher levels of energy efficiency because of new building techniques and materials. But if you want to go a step further, you may want to meet with a builder who can design and construct a “net zero” home that will produce more energy than it uses.

After the home is designed to maximize efficiency, these homes are enhanced with a geothermal heating and cooling system, extra insulation, energy-efficient windows and appliances, and solar shingles.

No matter what your priority is, a custom home can be designed to match it, limited only by your imagination and your budget.

●Get your financial plan in place first, otherwise you could run into limitations based on your budget.

●Look for a builder who works in the neighborhood where you want to live so they know about permitting and zoning issues.

●Finance your home with a lender who has construction-loan experience.

●Be prepared to spend a lot of time building a custom home and personally participating in a lot of decisions. The process typically takes a minimum of one year and often lasts 16 to 18 months.

●Involve a builder as well as an architect as early as possible to avoid designing a home that won’t work on your lot or will be too costly to complete.

●Make sure your design is appropriate for how long you plan to live in the home. If you anticipate staying forever, make sure the design is flexible to meet future needs.

●Once you’ve made a decision, try to move forward and not to rethink it. Change orders can be costly.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Architects put a modern twist on exposed beams in north Louisiana

IMG_0933The exposed beam design feature, rich in history with homes using these beams as their bones, has been enjoying a modern twist with builders and architects all across North Louisiana uncovering these beams or adding them to a home.

The exposed beam design feature — rich in history with homes using them as their bones — has been enjoying a modern twist with builders and architects all across north Louisiana.  Once the decision is made to either expose or add wooden beams to a home, where to go next?

One lumber company in Shreveport has offered quality materials to the Ark-La-Tex since 1860.  Able to ship, Allen Lumber is ready with any lumber-related material needs, residential or commercial.

General manager , Josh Callaway, suggests that the beam dream begins with a solid idea.

“Working with an interior designer and a contractor will help make these decisions to design the interior beam,” said Callaway.

This prominent architecture style for north Louisiana is found as a standard in most new build homes with interior wooden treatments boiling down to the homeowner’s distinct tastes, explained Callaway.   The trending beam choices at Allen Lumber & Millwork include cypress, cedar, faux beams and the ever popular re-claimed antique heart-wood pine.

With different species of wood displaying different colors, Callaway said that color hues and textures depend upon the type of wood.  For example, cypress offers a blonde color, as opposed to cedar, which has more of a red tint, according to Callaway. He mentioned that clear sealing the beam or adding a variety of different color stains can also bring out what ever color is desired.

“Whether a remodel or custom build, the beam element should look as if it was designed with the home and never as though it was an afterthought,” said Jim Fine, founder and vice president of Duggan & Fine Construction Company and Louisiana Home Builder’s Association president. He also was appointed to the Louisiana Licensing Board member by Gov. John Bel Edwards.

Beam construction is an element that can be integrated into any size home and is well within the reach of the typical working family — not something that needs to be reserved for luxurious homes, according to Fine, who has almost completed a 3,000-square foot home using beams in outdoor areas.

On the other side of the state, Thomas Woods, owner of Thomas Woods Construction in Monroe, has built all along the I-20 corridor.  Utilizing the beam element in the majority of his builds, Woods has been keen on this trend for some time.

Modern living in north Louisiana have homeowners opting to showcase load-bearing wooden beams, keeping with the national trends of bringing the outdoors into the home while turning an architectural element that was once hidden behind plaster into a main feature.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Structural Standpoint: What Makes a Home Foundation Sound?

IMG_0933Now that the American real estate market is enjoying a solid rebound, residential construction and custom-homebuilding are on the upswing. Prospective homeowners are once again interested in specialized homes, which entails making certain decisions about how the property should be built.

When it comes to choosing home foundations, future homeowners should think of the following:

Concrete Blocks vs. Poured Concrete Although masonry is an honored craft that has served humanity well for many centuries, stone and block foundations have been largely replaced by poured concrete. In some cases, a combination of concrete block and poured concrete can be used to support different parts of the house, but many builders these days mostly prefer poured foundations because they are known to reduce the potential for cracks and leaks.

Soil Analysis This step takes place before forming, and is one of the most important. The soil analysis takes into account water tables, ground conditions, potential impact of flood plains, and porosity. Choosing the right mix of backfill according to the soil analysis is crucial, particularly in areas where the ground is known to be very fertile, which means that it is rich in organic matter and bound to expand during the rainy season.

Types of Home Foundations Builders settle on the types of foundations they will use according to local building codes and the practicality of construction. In warm climates, a raised slab of poured concrete can be formed into a single unit that combines the footing with the actual foundation elements. A more unusual type of foundation involves building the home entirely on concrete piers; however, building codes now call for footing and pier foundations.

Materials Testing Laying out foundations primarily made of poured concrete is a laborious process. For this reason, it is not uncommon to run into situations whereby laborers may not lay a perfect foundation on the first attempt. Material testing is essential in residential construction, particularly in areas that are rich in aquifers or of high seismicity. Builders use concrete monitoring equipment, like the products found at Certified Material Testing Products, after the concrete mix has been poured and set to measure possible displacement and cracks caused by shifting of the foundation, backfill or soil. It is not unusual to repair foundations after pouring. Not all cracks or imperfections are caused by improper forming, and thus builders wait a few days to monitor how the concrete cures and sets.

Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off on Structural Standpoint: What Makes a Home Foundation Sound?

Custom homebuilding: What to know

Getting to make those choices is exactly what draws many people to custom home-building.  It means a bespoke home that’s a realization of your personal vision in every way and a nightmare for some.

Thinking of making your next home a custom-build? Here’s what to consider before you commit.

Six months after moving into their new home, Steve and Jane Nelli are still astonished every time they walk in.

“Our great room, with its panoramic view of the golf course. It’s just … impressive, every time. It came out exactly the way we envisioned – no, better actually,” Steve says.

The Nellis’ home at Suncadia Resort, which was built by Lynn Romans of WoodRidge Custom Homes, was the culmination of a year’s worth of hard work – and what felt like thousands of decisions.

“That was a surprise, as a first-time home builder,” says Steve. “How much work it was. How many decisions you have to make. From the big stuff like cabinetry and flooring to the little things like faucets and door knobs.”

Getting to make those choices is exactly what draws many people to custom home-building, says Michael Eide of Eide Homebuilders. It means a bespoke home that’s a realization of your personal vision in every way – a dream for some, and a nightmare for others.

“If you don’t have the time to invest in those decisions, custom isn’t for you,” says Jeff Hansell of Swiftwater Homes. “You should buy something move-in-ready.”

So for those who do choose to go the custom route, how do you do it right?

Eide, Hansell, and Steve all agree: the key is finding the right builder.

“You need to choose a contractor that you get along with, that you can trust,” says Hansell.  “I like to say that you’re going to get married for almost a year, so you’d better make sure this is someone you can work with.”

And like any good marriage, your relationship should be based on communication and honesty.

“Everyone needs to be upfront about their expectations from the get-go, especially around budget,” says Hansell. “I’ve had people at the end of a project tell me that they had this reserve budget set aside because they were told that everyone always goes over budget. In the end, that budget went unspent.”

Almost as important as hiring the right builder is hiring them at the right time – namely, as early in the process as possible, before design is finalized.

“Sometimes a client will come to me when everything’s designed,” says Eide. “At that point, it’s much harder to find cost savings. If we’re involved from the very beginning, we’re able to give cost estimates as the design proceeds so we can give them direction.”

Eide says this can have a huge impact on the bottom line. “When you plan and cost at the beginning, you’re able to strike a balance. What are the things that matter most to you? We might want to splurge a bit there, and we can balance that out with savings on the things that aren’t quite as important. It’s much more difficult to strike that balance when you’re making decisions as you go.”

According to Hansell, a good builder can help you establish those priorities by asking the right questions. “It’s not just a matter of, what kind of flooring do you like? A contractor considers the use of the home, where a family is in its lifecycle.

Sourced from Seattle Times.

Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off on Custom homebuilding: What to know

Builder reputation, personal lifestyle among considerations when building a custom home

With interest rates at near-historic lows and more families ready to invest in their “forever home,” homebuyers increasingly are considering building a custom home or partially customized home.

Many times buyers will come to us with ideas from different models or Houzz or something they’ve seen online, and we end up creating a hybrid of different concepts.”

If a buyer is interested in building a custom or semi-custom home, getting educated is the first step they should take.

The first thing you have to do is decide who’s going to live in the house, what are their needs over the time period you expect to live in the house.  So go out and look at a variety of houses and floor plans, and take notes of what features you like in particular.

Getting educated also involves finding a high-quality builder that you trust and feel comfortable working with over an extended period of time.

You have to have seen their product and the quality of their work, and you have to trust and like them.  The more you are going to customize, the more time you will spend with your builder.  If you’re doing a full custom job, you will be with them for a lot of time for a lot of months, so it’s important to know and feel comfortable with your builder.

Once you identify the right builder, you’ll want to arrive at your first meeting with a general idea of where you want to live, the floor plan you would like to build and a list of features that are important to you.

The builders know the process and they have been through it before. In some cases, builders work directly with the homeowner and help with all the decisions, and other builders have people and processes in place that can point you in the right directions.

When choosing between building a fully customized home from the ground up or purchasing a spec or model home that you can partially customize, the tradeoffs are fairly straightforward.

The more you customize a house, the more you get just what you want. The advantage of buying a spec house or model is you know exactly what you’re getting, you know exactly what price is up front and it’s available immediately.

The disadvantage of building a spec or a model is that you are going to get some things you don’t need that you are paying for. That’s the tradeoff.

Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off on Builder reputation, personal lifestyle among considerations when building a custom home

Looking for decorating ideas?

Anne and John Pinelli thought they’d stop at an open house to get some home-decorating ideas. With a young daughter and plans to grow their family, they knew they needed more space and already had an architect’s plans to accomplish that at their Cape Cod in River Vale.

The problem was the cost — almost $400,000 for renovations including a second-floor addition. What the couple, in their 30s, saw at the open house changed their minds entirely.

“It was our dream house and already finished,” said Anne, of the newly constructed colonial on Ruckman Road they both fell in love with. Far from a cookie-cutter colonial, this custom house wowed her with its kitchen and master bath, which Anne calls “the most beautiful rooms in the house.”

“The old home was compartmentalized,” John said. “If you wanted to watch TV, you couldn’t speak to someone who was in the kitchen cooking.”

But their new home provides an open floor plan that maximizes the kitchen — they both have a passion for cooking — and also connects a dining area and great room.

As the couple relaxed recently on the wraparound deck of their new home and their daughter Eva Marie, who’s almost 3 years old, scurried around showing off her favorite toys, John reflected on how moments like this would have had to wait for the planned renovations to be completed.

“We would have still been doing the renovation as opposed to enjoying everything,” said John, who is a high-risk insurance wholesaler.

“It’s a little bit more of a monthly payment without having our daughter grow up in a renovation.”

Anne, a sales finance manager and native of France who is expecting their second child in January, also was relieved that they took a simpler route to buying the new house as opposed to fixing up their 50-year-old Cape.

“We are two busy people with full-time jobs, and going through renovations is time-consuming,” she said. “The contractor said we would have to move out [during the work].”

“You have to choose your battles,” Anne said, and renovation wasn’t one of them.

The couple who purchased the River Vale house in 2014 after living in London for seven years, never realized they could afford new construction.

They credit their sales agent, Antoinette Gangi of Keller Williams Valley Realty, with helping them to see that the Hillsdale house — once reduced to $899,000 — was within their reach.

The couple took Gangi’s advice to make their offer close to asking at $890,000 because they already had a possible strike against them — they had to sell their Cape to make any of this happen.

Gangi had worked with the custom home builder, Tom Karach, owner of Barco Construction, before and she was able to convince him that she’d sell the house quickly … and that she did.

Ironically, the couple had never given much thought to living in Hillsdale, which is in Bergen County’s Pascack Valley, an area buyers like for good schools and easy commutes to New York City.

The Ruckman Road eye-opener just happened to be on the route to a relative’s house, when they decided to check it out. Doing so changed the course of their life.

This is why their advice to other families who might be contemplating renovations is to be open-minded.

Besides a finished basement and a spacious yard that might be just right for a future swimming pool, their new home offers many custom features that the couple could see firsthand during their tour.

“The builder takes so much pride,” said Anne, adding that if she had to design her own house, this would have been her style.

Anne and John Pinelli thought they’d stop at an open house in Hillsdale to get some home-decorating ideas. With a young daughter and plans to grow their family, they knew they needed more space and already had an architect’s plans to accomplish that at their Cape Cod in River Vale.

The problem was the cost — almost $400,000 for renovations including a second-floor addition. What the couple, in their 30s, saw at the open house in January 2015 changed their minds entirely.

“It was our dream house and already finished,” said Anne, of the newly constructed colonial on Ruckman Road they both fell in love with. Far from a cookie-cutter colonial, this custom house wowed her with its kitchen and master bath, which Anne calls “the most beautiful rooms in the house.”

“The old home was compartmentalized,” John said. “If you wanted to watch TV, you couldn’t speak to someone who was in the kitchen cooking.”

But their new home provides an open floor plan that maximizes the kitchen — they both have a passion for cooking — and also connects a dining area and great room.

As the couple relaxed recently on the wraparound deck of their new home and their daughter Eva Marie, who’s almost 3 years old, scurried around showing off her favorite toys, John reflected on how moments like this would have had to wait for the planned renovations to be completed.

“We would have still been doing the renovation as opposed to enjoying everything,” said John, who is a high-risk insurance wholesaler.

“It’s a little bit more of a monthly payment without having our daughter grow up in a renovation.”

Anne, a sales finance manager and native of France who is expecting their second child in January, also was relieved that they took a simpler route to buying the new house as opposed to fixing up their 50-year-old Cape.

“We are two busy people with full-time jobs, and going through renovations is time-consuming,” she said. “The contractor said we would have to move out [during the work].”

“You have to choose your battles,” Anne said, and renovation wasn’t one of them.

The couple who purchased the River Vale house in 2014 after living in London for seven years, never realized they could afford new construction.

They credit their sales agent, Antoinette Gangi of Keller Williams Valley Realty, with helping them to see that the Hillsdale house — once reduced to $899,000 — was within their reach.

The couple took Gangi’s advice to make their offer close to asking at $890,000 because they already had a possible strike against them — they had to sell their Cape to make any of this happen.

Gangi had worked with the custom home builder, Tom Karach, owner of Barco Construction, before and she was able to convince him that she’d sell the house quickly … and that she did.

Ironically, the couple had never given much thought to living in Hillsdale, which is in Bergen County’s Pascack Valley, an area buyers like for good schools and easy commutes to New York City.

The Ruckman Road eye-opener just happened to be on the route to a relative’s house, when they decided to check it out. Doing so changed the course of their life.

This is why their advice to other families who might be contemplating renovations is to be open-minded.

Besides a finished basement and a spacious yard that might be just right for a future swimming pool, their new home offers many custom features that the couple could see firsthand during their tour.

“The builder takes so much pride,” said Anne, adding that if she had to design her own house, this would have been her style.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Tesla’s solar roof rollout was … meh. These other new solar power gadgets are cooler

Last Friday evening, Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk unveiled three new products. The rollout — scheduled, oddly, for 8:30 pm Eastern — had been hyped for weeks, but the actual event turned out to be a bit [sad trombone]. It was a fairly transparent bid to justify the proposed merger of Tesla and SolarCity to investors, but if I were one of those investors, I would not be very reassured.

Still, the market Tesla is targeting — which doesn’t yet have a snappy name but involves consumer-side electricity generation, storage, and management, along with electric vehicles — is beginning to hop anyway. (I’ll cover a couple of the potentially groundbreaking new products in that market below.) Whether or not the Tesla/SolarCity merger succeeds, that market is destined for big things.

First, though, let’s get the Tesla news out of the way.

The biggest news was the long-rumored solar roof. Specifically, Tesla has developed four different styles of rooftop solar shingles: Tuscan, slate, textured, and smooth.

From a purely aesthetic perspective, these are pretty slick. They are made to appear almost indistinguishable from normal shingles from a low angle (i.e., when viewed from the street), while the view from above reveals embedded solar cells.

According to Musk, these roofs can be expected to last much longer than a normal roof — up to 50 years, versus around 20 — because the shingles are much more resilient than typical roofing shingles; they are covered with a layer of tempered glass. This is what happens when you drop a weight on them:

And … that’s about all we know about them. Musk had nothing to say about how much energy they would generate, how much they would cost, who would sell or install or repair them, how they could be prevented from overheating in intense sunlight, or when they would be available. (Julian Spector has a good take on the many unanswered questions.)

The whole thing was less like a product introduction than a trailer for a product introduction, which seems like a strange move for a company already facing investor skepticism. There was nothing in this announcement to reassure investors that Tesla has a solid business plan for solar roofs. It showed that Tesla can make a pretty product, but then, everyone already knew that.

There was also the Powerwall 2, the new version of Tesla’s home battery. It is basically a bigger, boxier version of the first Powerwall, with twice the energy capacity. (Musk claims it can power a four-bedroom house for a full day.) Importantly, it also has a built-in inverter, reducing the need for additional equipment and installation work.

Along with the Powerwall 2 was the Powerpack 2, which began shipping in September. The updated version of Tesla’s utility-scale battery storage packs twice the energy density and the “lowest cost, highest efficiency and highest power density utility-scale inverter on the market.” The first couple of Powerpack 2 installations are already underway.

All in all, it was an underwhelming show from Tesla. The roof tiles are handsome, but all the details relevant to their commercial prospects remain unknown. The batteries are getting better and the Gigafactory is paying off, but we already knew that too.

So, all right, forget Tesla. They’re not the only ones who make cool things! There are many, many other companies developing products for this nascent market. Let’s look at a couple of cool energy gadgets that have debuted recently.

In September, a company called SunCulture released the SolPad and SolPad Mobile, which are, for my money, the coolest energy tech to debut this year.

The SolPad is a rooftop solar panel, a battery, an inverter, and energy management software all in a single unibody enclosure.

The battery on the back side is not a standard lithium-ion, like Tesla’s, with a liquid electrolyte. Instead it is solid-state, which the company claims is less flammable, has a wider range of operating temperatures, and lasts much longer than standard lithium-ion batteries.

The panels snap together like Legos, with a little widget called the Connect:

The last panel in the string is connected to any normal home electrical outlet — no fancy custom wiring required.

The company projects that total installed costs of SolPad rooftop systems will be up to 50 percent less than comparable systems. (Of course, comparable systems would include solar panels, storage, and control software, which is a pretty high-end package.) They say they’ll achieve these cost reductions through “the integration or elimination of balance-of-system parts,” reductions in “soft costs” like customer acquisition and installation, and manufacturing efficiencies.

There’s one more cool part to this: the SolPad Mobile. It is, as the name indicates, a freestanding, portable version of the SolPad.

It’s small enough that a single person can easily carry it. On the back, it’s pretty simple. There’s a port to connect it to a normal electrical outlet (at which point it will feed energy into the building). There’s a port to connect it to another SolPad. And there are a few USB ports, for phone charging and the like.

Any number of these can be easily connected to one another to form an impromptu microgrid.

Fun extra: SolPad Mobile talks to you. There’s smart software inside and the surface is pressure-sensitive, so you can just tap it and it will tell you how best to orient it to maximize power generation, how much it’s generating, and how much juice is left in its battery.

All the promotional materials show well-groomed white people using the SolPad Mobile on their fancy decks, but the obvious applications for this kind of product are in the developing world, many parts of which lack reliable electricity.

Remote communities with no grid connection could use this system as a sturdy, scalable, and dead-simple source of power, to charge their phones or run electric lights. Urban households connected to an unreliable grid could use it for backup power, ensuring that their most important devices or appliances remain running even as grid power goes in and out.

Remote research, military ground operations, field hospitals in areas struck by disasters — the uses for portable power and storage like this are endless.

SunCulture is making a huge bet here: that integration and ease of use will do for solar what they did for PCs, i.e., justify higher upfront costs. If you want to know more, watch this overwrought but informative video:

Okay, I got really excited about the SolPad, so I’ll be more brief on this one.

In July, a new company called Solar Window Technologies, which has been working in collaboration with NREL, unveiled its SolarWindow. It is, as the name suggests, a window that generates power. Here’s how the press released describes it:

The company’s SolarWindow™ generates electricity when its transparent organic coatings are applied in thin layers on to glass surfaces. The SolarWindow™ Intra-Connection System, announced today, moves electricity within these electricity-generating coatings to the company’s previously developed ‘invisible wires’. In turn, these ‘invisible wires’ transport electricity across the surface to the edge of the glass, where it’s connected to building electrical systems.

The “invisible wires” are “approximately 50 micrometers (µm) wide,” which is effectively invisible to the naked human eye.

The result is a normal-looking window with a pleasant tint.

The company says the windows, unlike conventional or crystalline PV panels, work in “natural, shaded, and even indoor light.” The target application is large urban towers and skyscrapers, where SolarWindow can outperform conventional PV “50-fold,” the company claims — for the simple reason that conventional PV only fits on a tiny area on the roof, where solar windows can cover the building and capture all light, from any angle.

The company claims a one-year payback, based on “independently validated financial modeling results.” In part, those savings are due to the way the windows are manufactured. The process requires no high-temperature or high-vacuum production techniques (unlike most thin-film solar products). Applying thin layers of liquid to glass is well-suited to “high-speed manufacturing techniques” like “roll-to-roll and sheet-to-sheet manufacturing.”

And there are big opportunities in the big-building market. Commercial buildings use about 40 percent of US electricity. A full solar window installation can cover 30 to 50 percent of a skyscraper’s energy consumption needs.

Crucially, the company has also developed a transparent veneer that can be applied to existing windows, which opens up an enormous retrofit market. Making existing buildings into solar generators doesn’t require any new land or space — and there are more windows than there are rooftops.

The point of all this is that the market Tesla is targeting with its acquisition of SolarCity (I really need a snappy name for it) is going to flourish whether or not Tesla’s particular products succeed.

I have no idea if the SolPad or SolarWindow will be commercially successful. But if SolPad is not the user-friendly all-in-one solar product that busts out into the mass market, some other version will be. Now that researchers know how to make windows into power generators with liquid polymer coatings, some company is going to figure out how to capture that market, whether or not it’s SolarWindow.

It will sputter and lurch for a while, with lots of startup casualties, but this market is going to happen. Solar is getting cheap and super, super small; as that happens, it will be integrated into more and more products, from roofs to windows to roads to parking garages to fabrics to tents and backpacks. Similarly, batteries are getting cheaper and more sophisticated and will be showing up in more and more places.

Eventually, power generation and storage will become ambient, something that simply happens, throughout the urban infrastructure. With that will come more and more sophisticated software for managing, sharing, and economizing all that power. (Al Gore used to call this coming electricity-internet hybrid the “enernet,” but it never really took off.)

In this arena, as in others it has entered, Tesla’s main goal is to accelerate the market’s maturation — to push forward a sustainable future. Its rooftop solar tiles will likely end up a footnote in the grand scheme of things, but the market those tiles are attempting to jump-start will one day change the world as much as the internet has.

Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off on Tesla’s solar roof rollout was … meh. These other new solar power gadgets are cooler

Buying A Home: 7 Tips For Making Your Biggest Investment Decision – Huffington Post

Usually people get to wade gradually into investing. Buying a house is more like a plunge into the deep end.

With other investments, you can start small and then make bigger commitments as you gain a little experience. So, you put a few hundred dollars into a stock, or have money going into a 401(k) retirement savings plan. Then you ramp up to bigger investment decisions over time. When you buy your first house though, you may be committing hundreds of thousands of dollars to a type of decision you have never made before.

To help overcome that lack of experience, think through the process of buying a home from an investment standpoint.

Buying a home is a form of investment, but it is not like most other investments you will make. For one thing, your home does not generate interest or dividend income – just the opposite in fact. In addition to your mortgage payments, your home will regularly cost you insurance premiums and real estate taxes.

The other difference between a house and ordinary investments is that real estate is not a very liquid market. The process of buying and selling a house can cost you money. Those heavy transaction costs increase the odds you have to overcome to make the investment a success.

7 tips to make your home purchase pay off financially

How do you overcome financial obstacles and make your home purchase pay off as an investment?

Buying and selling a home can be costly, but real estate tends to appreciate in value over the long term. That is why you need to buy with a long time horizon in mind. Think about how the future of your family and career will impact what you need from a home. Don’t be too enamored with the idea of a “starter home” because a short-term home purchase is more likely to be a financial loser than a long-term one.

Think about where you are living, and whether you see yourself staying there for many years to come. This will not only help you avoid the cost of a relatively short-term purchase and sale. It will also help you to factor housing costs into your decision about whether to stay where you are currently.

The most expensive metropolitan housing market in the U.S. is 10 times more expensive than the cheapest. So, if you live in a pricey area, you have to make sure your career prospects justify the additional expense.

As valuable as building home equity can be, in some expensive markets, it may not offset the interest, insurance and tax costs involved in buying a home. When you net out all those costs, you might find you can save money by renting at a faster rate than you would build in equity by buying a home.

Any dings in your history can cost you in the form of higher down payment requirements and higher mortgage rates. View keeping your credit healthy as an investment, because it will pay off over a long period of time if you do.

Every real estate agent you talk to will have a favorite rule of thumb about what percentage of your income should go into a house payment, but there is more to it than that. Home affordability involves a very individual set of circumstances that includes your other financial obligations plus the stability and growth potential of your income.

A larger down payment can help you qualify for a lower mortgage rate, and the time it takes you to save up that larger down payment will give you more time to get to know the local housing market so you will be better prepared to spot a true deal when the time comes.

Mortgage rates, insurance and even legal and appraisal fees can all vary, so don’t sign on to anything before you’ve done a little comparison shopping.

Of course, your home should represent more to you than just an investment. It may be a commitment you and your spouse make to your future together. As you go through life and perhaps raise a family, it can become the setting for decades of memories. That future and those memories also have value. Making the right investment decision about buying a house can help protect those other forms of value as well.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

That Nip in the Air Means It’s Time to Winterize, Says Cooper Mechanical

Homeowners are feeling a chill.  HVAC firms urge their customers to take action before temperatures drop even further.

HVAC firms have released a list of suggestions for how customers can winterize their homes so they can easily settle into the season. If homeowners undertake a single winterization task this season, it should be tuning up their heating system. HVAC technicians are ready to provide quick, convenient and thorough services ranging from routine inspection to hot water heater repair .

Homeowners who have not already scheduled routine preventative maintenance through HVAC firms should consider a contract, the small expense of which will contribute greatly to long-term savings on fuel and repairs. Additionally, HVAC firms can install extra improvements to any heating system, such as Wi-Fi programmable thermostats, which help homeowners maintain comfortable home temperatures from anywhere with Wi-Fi access.

HVAC firms offers other suggestions for protecting homes against the winter elements and preserving a heating system’s energy efficiency. Homeowners are advised to seal ducts, windows and doorways to prevent the loss of heat–drafts can cause a loss of up to 30% on heating bills. Homeowners should not neglect the impact of exterior winterization, either: Maintaining the condition of shingles, gutters and chimneys will maximize the efficiency of any home heating system.

Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off on That Nip in the Air Means It’s Time to Winterize, Says Cooper Mechanical